Replacements
by darkmickyangel
Summary: In which the Guardians discover Jack suffers from brain damage from regaining his memories; making him think that Jamie is actually his sister. Written upon learning the real meaning of Jamie's name, explanation inside. Cover art from: senaizumi on tumblr.
1. Chapter 1

Update: the links I left weren't working so I've updated them. also disclaimer for cover art.

AN: Greetings, sorry I know it has been almost a full year since I started _rebellion_, and I should definitely finish that before doing anything else. I almost have it finished; the ending just keeps being _bleh_. I think I've rewritten it like seven times now… but no worries! I will get it done! Just… sorry that it has taken so long.

I wrote this fan fiction as a request for my friend Sora when I was looking up names for another fanfiction, (ironically) and came across the meaning for the name Bennett. Now I believe that names having meanings in stories is always important, but when you discover something like this it is a little creepy. So Bennett means "little blessed one" thinking this cool, so I went to look up Jamie's name to see what Jamie Bennett means. Apparently Jamie means 'supplant'…. which means 'replacement' …. Therefore Jamie Bennett's name means "the replacement of the little blessed one" 0.o I took this as Jack using Jamie as a replacement for his little sister, and after seeing the movie again I can't help but keep thinking this. Thus this fan fiction has been created. FYI Sophie means "wise" so Sophie Bennett means "the wise little blessed one"

I do not own Rise of the Guardians, or any of the characters in this story.

I also do not own the cover art I have used for this story, I found the image on google, and followed it to its tumblr source. However the account that originaly uploaded it is closed, so… yeah. It was uploaded by someone called senaizumi, and if he/she wants me to take the picture down I will.

* * *

It had been almost three months since the final battle with pitch and Bunnymund was walking toward the Bennett house, easily hauling a huge bag of art supplies over one shoulder. Sophie had been asking Jack if 'the big bunny' could come over and play ever since the battle with Pitch. It had been three months since the battle, and Bunny had spent the entire time since then diligently restoring his warren. Now, after the mess had been cleaned up, he thought he ought to visit the little ankle bitter. He was just passing through the woods when he heard the familiar voice of the winter spirit filtering through the trees "no it is green."

"No," bunny's ears perked up a little, recognizing the voice of Jamie Bennett, "it is red. I told you this before, Jack please don't tell me we're going to go through this again" Bunny could just feel the exasperation in Jamie's tone, a little wary Bunny changed his course to approach the two.

"What are you talking about?" Jack frowned, he was kneeling next to Jamie near his frozen lake, talking to the brunet boy next to him "I don't see how this is so hard, your favorite color is green, so I got you a green one." He held up a wooden green toy, presenting it proudly to the little boy, "Phil painted it himself"

Jamie laid his hands gently on Jack's hands, "Jack. Thank You and make sure to thank Phil for me as well, but that isn't the problem here." Jamie looked seriously at the winter spirit in front of him, "My favorite color is _red_ Jack. _Red_ not green," jack looked like he was about to say something, but Jamie held up a hand to silence him "You keep doing this and it is starting to make me concerned"

"But your favorite color is green," Jack said as if it was the simplest thing in the world, then for the briefest moment Jack's eyes fell on Bunny, who was standing over in the bushes. The winter spirit froze for a second, then looked back down at Jamie, "I- guess I forgot, sorry. I'll have Phil repaint it." He took his hands away from Jamie and shoved the green toy into his jacket pocket.

"No, it's fine that it's green" Jamie said, "It's that you keep-"

"Hey Bunny," Jack hailed, cutting off the little kid in front of him, "how long are you planning on lurking over there?"

"Not long," Bunny said, walked out from behind the bushes, "I just came up actually, what you are two up to?"

"Nothing," Jack said, "just a little misunderstanding is all" he glanced down at Jamie quickly before looking back at the giant rabbit, "I eh, had Phil paint a toy for Jamie the wrong color. Forgot his favorite color." Jack said, trying to look a little guilty for a second before changing subjects, "so, what brings you here? What's the bag for?"

"Paint supplies," Bunny said shifting the bag on his shoulder, "going to paint with Sophie, want to join us?"

"Like egg painting?" Jamie said, eyes widening, "really?"

"Well I also brought canvases, but if you want I have some eggs you can paint." Bunny smiled as the kid in front of him jumped for joy. Pretending not to see the look Jack was giving him out of the corner of his eye. The winter spirit looked ticked off, however his expression changed when the child turned back to him.

"Jack, we're going to paint Easter Eggs!" Jamie said, turning to the winter spirit, "and it isn't even Easter yet!"

"Awesome," Jack said matching the kid's enthusiasm immediately, however bunny could feel that the spirit was only acting, "go get your sister and bring her here, me and bunny will set up the supplies"

"Okay, I'll be right back" Jamie said, as he ran off, nearly tripping as he looked back at them before reaching the trees.

As soon as the child was out of earshot, Bunny confronted jack "what was that?"

"What was what?"

"That looks you had on your face when Jamie wasn't looking at you"

"What look, I don't know what you're talking about" Jack said avoided, Bunny's gaze "I didn't make a look, I mean well there had to be something on my face. But I… don't know what look you are… talking about." he finished uncertainly, tapping his fingers on his wooden staff.

"You know what I'm talking about" Bunny said accusingly, then blinked as he realized, "oh my god you're jealous. Jealous because Jamie was happy to see me!"

"What no!" Jack denied, voice going high "well, maybe a little mad but jealous?" he snorted .

"Jack this is ridiculous" Bunny said, shaking his head, "I know Jamie's your first believer, and you are the best of friends, but you can't get mad just because he believes in another spirits. That's like saying he's only allowed to have one friend in his entire life"

"Well, it's just that I had planned to hang out with just him today" Jack mumbled angrily, shuffling the dirt at his feet, "then you showed up and ruined those plans"

"I'm sorry I ruined your plans" Bunny said honestly, "I didn't mean to do that. But jack" he made the teen look at him, "kids are fickle, they like doing things differently. You shouldn't get angry or resentful if they want to play with someone different every now and then. "

Jack nodded, then stepped away looking guilty, "yeah, I know. It's just… she finally sees me, you know?"

"She?" Bunny said quirking up an eyebrow, "I know I'm not exactly human but I'm pretty sure Jamie is male"

"HE" Jack said, frost accumulating on his cheeks in a blush, as he corrected himself "He- I know he is a boy stop laughing! It was a slip of the tong" Jack hit Bunny on the shoulder to stop him from laughing, "come on, let's set up your stupid rabbit paint supplies."

"Yeah, yeah" Bunny said placing his bag of paint supplies on the ground, "hey maybe you could repaint that toy you were going to give Jamie now, instead of bugging Phil about it later."

"oh, that's a great idea!" Jack said as they spread a small tarp out onto the ground, "Thanks Bunny!"

Soon the two of them had the paint supplies out, and Jamie returned with his sister. The next three hours were spent painting with the children, Jamie doing eggs and Sophie and Bunny painting on small squares of canvas that Bunnymund had brought. Bunnymund wish he could say they all had fun, but the entire time a cloud of awkwardness hung in the air between Jack and Jamie. It was almost as if Jack's presence was making the kid uncomfortable, and Bunnymund could only assume it had something to do with the almost argument the two had been having earlier. It didn't help at all that Jack was completely oblivious to Jamie's attitude, cracking jokes and being his usual self. The awkwardness reached its max when Jack gave Jamie his repainted toy at the end of the day.

"thanks Jack," Jamie said taking what appeared to be a wooden toy from Jack "do… you mind walking us home? It's getting pretty dark"

"uh yeah, no problem. Bunny I'll be back in a second to help clean up, okay?" Jack said referring to the mess of brushes and paint on the tarp beside the rabbit. He took Jamie and Sophie's hand and started walking away. As the three walked off, Jamie turned around and looked back at Bunny. He gazed strait into the rabbit's eyes, a very serious look on his face, almost as if he was trying to convey a message, before turning to reply to something Jack was telling him. Bunny frowned, wondering what the kid was trying to tell him. He found out when he turned back to the tarp beside him. Jamie had left behind his wool hat, which upon inspection had a piece of paper inside it. _Need to talk. no Jack._ Was scrawled on a torn sheet of paper in a child's handwriting.

Bunny frowned at the message, but smiled at the ingenuity Jamie showed at sending the message. He quickly crumpled the message, though, when he felt the wind stir around him signaling the winter spirit's return. "hey, did the kids get home okay?" Bunny asked without even looking at the spirit behind him.

"yup," Jack said happily "just in time for dinner."

"that's good to hear," Bunny said putting the caps back on the paint and stowing them away.

"oh no," Jack paused from picking up the brushes when he caught sight of Jamie's hat, "Jamie left his hat."

"oh, yeah you guys had already left when I noticed it" Bunny said, picking the piece of clothing up.

"Pass it here; I'll drop it off at his house once we clean this up, before I head back to the south pole"

"wait, the south pole? What are you doing there?" Bunny frowned.

"well, I have a storm system that needs to be moved, and another to start, but I'll just drop it off, it's on the way anyhow" Jack said holding his hand out for the hat.

"nah, I got it, you go on ahead and get to your storms," Bunny said, "wouldn't want something bad to happen, weather wise I mean" he then gave jack a stern look that clearly said _if you had work like that what were you even doing here playing with the kids? And don't think I won't be telling North about this._ Jack paused, torn for a second, before saying farewell and heading south. _It's like he's obsessed with the kid or something _Bunny noted, watching the spirit fly off _right time to get to the bottom of this._

The Bennett family was busy with dinner, but Bunny was content to wait until the family was done eating passing the time in the back yard, cleaning off the paint brushes. When Bunny heard Jamie's mother close the door with a 'sweet dreams' did he tap the roof with his foot and jump into the boy's room. Jamie sat frozen on his bed for a second, before visibly relaxing "oh, good I was starting to think you didn't get my message"

"after such an obvious clue, I'm not your average rabbit mate," Bunny chuckled, "here's your hat back, by the way"

"thanks," Jamie said, taking the hat and throwing it on his bedside table, "I'm really glad you came. I think something's wrong with Jack. I tried talking to him about it yesterday and today, but he keeps acting like nothing's wrong. I was actually considering mailing a letter to The North Pole to get into contact with Santa. But you came so I didn't have too."

"really now?" Bunny couldn't help but smile, trying to imagine North's reaction to getting mail this out of season "Well it's a good thing I came by then, what's up?"

"Jack keeps acting really weird" Jamie said, "and by really, I mean really, really, really weird. Like the toy he gave to me today" Jamie pointed to the wooden figure on his desk. This close Bunny could see that it was a toy horse, carved from some tree wood, and painted green and red "he insists that I asked my dad for a toy horse the other week, but my dad's been in California this entire month and I'm pretty certain I didn't ask for a toy _horse._ I don't hate the animals, but I would rather have a robot."

"Is this the first time this has happened?" Bunny asked, once Jamie had finished his small rant.

"no," Jamie said, "Last month he came up to me as told me that Mom wanted us to do the house chores. Not that mom was looking for Sophie and I to do them. Like he thought that my mom and his mom are the same mom. After I asked him what he meant he gave me this funny look and then snapped out of it. He tried to play it off as a weird joke. But then the next week he asked me how my knitting was coming along. _Knitting, _Bunnymund. I don't knit. I'm a ten year old boy, not a grandma." Jamie paused to take a breath and calm down. He sat on the side of his bed and looked up at Bunny with his deep brown eyes, "Is Jack going to be okay?"

"I don't know kid" Bunnymund admitted, sitting down on the bed and patting him on the shoulder "I'm not a shrink. But I will get down to the bottom of this. Jack will be back to normal before you know it. Thank you for telling me this. I'm going to go talk to the other Guardians, and we'll confront Jack about it. We'll figure out what's going on and help Jack."

The kid smiled, obviously relieved, "thank you, I've been so worried about him. I mean I've heard from shows how much people can get wrapped up in their own worlds and end up not being able to accept reality"

"don't you worry about a thing," Bunny smiled, "I'm gonna head off now. Good night"

"night, tell everyone I said hello" Jamie yawned climbing back under his covers, "thank you for coming Bunny. You should come by more often, Sophie loves painting with you"

"I know kid, I'll try and come around more often" Bunny said, before jumping into one of his tunnels, _looks like I'll be having guests over tonight._

* * *

AN: If you don't believe me about the names by the way here are the sites I found this out on, just copy the URLs into your browser (remove the spaces)

think baby names meaning / 0 / jamie

for Jamie's name, Sophie means wisdom, I got that from this same site.

uk. answers. yahoo question / index ?qid = 20100309032408AAwyTei

look at the second post around the middle and you will find Bennett.


	2. Chapter 2

Here is the second chapter for "Replacement" I suspect this story will be about three or four chapters, though not for sure though.

I do not own Rise of the Guardians, or any of the characters in this story.

I also do not own the cover art I have used for this story, I found the image on google, and followed it to its tumblr source. However the account that originally uploaded it is closed, so… yeah. It was uploaded by someone called senaizumi, and if he/she wants me to take the picture down I will.

* * *

The guardians couldn't help but feeling guilty after they discovered that Jack, an everlasting child, had been neglected for so long by the guardians. Therefore in the months following the battle with Pitch they worked hard to make sure Jack knew that he was no longer alone. Sandy always made sure to play with the winter spirit in passing, and Tooth made sure to smother the boy with motherly love, and North opened up the pole to the winter spirit as a second home. Bunnymund (knowing how oppressing his team mates could be) made sure the kid had a place to escape to when North and Tooth's the smothering got to heavy. Even if it meant ice patches in his tunnels and frozen golems. The guardians up to this point were pretty certain they were doing a fair job of helping Jack recover, but from what Jamie had told Bunny that evening Jack wasn't doing as well as the Guardians thought. There was something else the three centuries of loneliness had done to Jack, and things were just coming to light.

As soon as Bunnymund had gotten back from the warren he had sent a golem to call each of the guardians to his base. By the time Bunny had put his bag of art supplies away, and walked back out onto his patio, Tooth and North had arrived. Both looking concerned.

"what is news?" North asked, standing up from one of Bunny's wooden chairs, "you rarely ask us to meet here unless it's important"

"let's wait till Sandy gets here" Bunny said, "but it's about Jack, Jamie says he's acting weird"

"is he sick?" Tooth asked, hovering nervously.

"No, he's just," Bunny sighed "it's hard to explain I'd rather do it only once so let's wait till Sandy gets here" Said Sandy flew in three minutes later, looking very worried, golden question marks floating above his head. Bunny immediately recounted everything Jamie had told him, and his own experience with Jack that day as well, "it's like he's zoning out to a different time, and thinking Jamie's a part of it" Bunny ended with a huff.

"Or Jamie is triggering the episodes," North mused, scratching his beard, "maybe he reminds Jack of someone he knows? Has he been doing this around any of the other kids?"

"I don't know, Sophie didn't seem to notice anything off at all" Bunny shrugged, "frankly I'm lost. I can deal with physical problems but not this mental stuff. I'm not a bloody shrink"

"This is not good," Tooth muttered, fluttering a little higher, concern written on her face. Sandy conjured a question mark to convey the simple question _what do you mean?_ Tooth shook her head, "I think these episodes probably have something to do with remembering his past. It sounds like he might be having confabulations."

"Confabulations?" North asked, frowning at Tooth, "How could remembering past cause brain damage"

Tooth smoothed down her feathers nervously, "well, Jack didn't know anything about his past before getting them back. All of his memories were thrown at him at once, without any sort of filter for strong emotions. If you have to restore someone's memories you have to do it a bit at a time, so the mind can process each memory. If you don't do it a bit at a time it's like trying to poor water through a funnel, only through the wrong end. The brain just can't process all of the memories at once"

"Wait hold up one tick, what's a confabulation?" Bunny held up his arms, making a stopping motion.

"A Confabulation is a memory disruption," North said, looking at the table grimly, "such as when someone can't tell the difference between reality and their dreams. They think stuff happened, but it didn't. It is a form of brain damage."

Tooth frowned then said "one theory is that people with confabulations is that they have no sense of time. They remember things, but can't tell when things happened. To them recalled events could have happened yesterday, but in it was years ago. Well, at least that's one theory that's out there" Tooth paused, "Maybe the mass of memories that the brain hasn't processed might be causing Jack to have moments where he jumps back into your past"

"So basically Jack is confusing Jamie is someone from his past" Bunny said, "but he can't tell the difference because the memories in Jack's head are messing his thinking up." Sandy gave him thumbs up. "So… what do we do about all this? And is Jamie in any danger, I mean should we try and keep Jack away from him?"

North sighed "I don't think Jamie's in any danger, but I don't think things will be easy for him. Good thing is Jamie that jack is projecting his memories, on. Jamie is smart child and knows not to take it personally. Tooth how do we get Jack's brain to process these memories safely?"

Tooth flittered around nervously "Depends, really. I mean if he cooperates then some intense mediation could help. However if he doesn't… we're going to have to trigger the majority of Jack's memories so he can process them, basically mentally walk him through them."

"I didn't think Jack would want use messing around in his head like that Tooth. Jack still doesn't trust us completely" Bunny said, "He barely comes to us with problems as it is. You remember two weeks ago when he cut his leg on that ice? He didn't come to the pole until it was badly infected and he had a fever! How are we supposed to gain his trust if one of the first things we do is root around his private thoughts?"

"You are right bunny," North said, stepping between the Rabbit and Fairy, "we cannot just ask Jack to let us into his mind. We are lucky Bunny caught this problem early. If we had not noticed until much later things could have been far worse." North went quiet for a second deep in thought "I say first step is to tell Jack about confabulations, so he knows that there is problem, and he is aware of it. We then discuss with Jack where to move from there. How is he to trust us if we make plans behind his back? Jack may be child, but he is also Guardian. He should not be kept out of the loop, especially when matters are about him." Sandy showed his agreement with North by giving him two thumbs up and Toothina looked a little doubtful. Bunny made sure not to show any emotion. Regardless North continued, "We meet at Pole tomorrow with Jack and discuss this matter. Now, I must get going in preparation for meeting with Yetis. See you all tomorrow, yes?" With that the group split up, each going back to their respective duties. Bunny watched Tooth fly off into the distance, Sandy not far behind, and couldn't help but hope that solving this problem was as simple as North said it was.

* * *

Jack had the wind land him on the roof silently, so as not to disturb the occupants of the house below. Jack winced as his feet walked across the still warm roof to the other side, and rubbed his arms. It was so warm, and it made Jack's skin crawl. _One of the downsides of being a frost spirit. Maybe Bunny was right; I should probably go and spend a few days back down south before I start to defrost. But I can't leave her alone… at least without saying good bye._ Jack froze his Jacket, making a cold environment for his body to inhabit, and crouched on the roof and directed his gaze across the street. From this vantage point Jack could see strait into his sitter's window, and see her sleeping soundly on her bed. Jack smiled and rested his head on the side of his cane. Now being a Guardian, he had duties other than being a big brother, but that didn't mean he didn't have time to stand guard of his sibling. Jack sighed, and shifted his position so he was more comfy, ready to stand his vigil for the night. _I'll tell her tomorrow morning when she wakes up that I have to head back south, I'll stay there for a full week before heading back up._ Jack thought.

He sat there, perched on the roof for two content hours, it was just when the sun peaked its head over the small town of Burgess, that Jack felt the wind around him shutter, and his skin caught fire. Knowing that these reactions herald the arrival of a particular spirit, he stood up and turned around, just as a man, with a strong chin and as tan as Jack was pail landed on the other side of the roof.

"Notus, how good to see you, how have you been?" Jack smiled, using the slightly sarcastic voice he reserved purely for Bunny and the spirit in front of him.

"Busy," the Spirit of summer frowned, crossing his arms, "what are you doing up here? You should be down south,"

"But you said it was okay if I came and visited my believers every now and then" Jack said, shuffling his feet, "that's all I'm doing."

"You have been here for _days_, Jack" Notus said, walking closer to Jack, who couldn't help but lean away from the heat coming off of the spirit. "When I gave you permission to come up here I meant that you could come up and visit maybe one a month Jack, do you have any idea how hard it is to make hurricanes without you on the other side of the equator to send the cold water up? I haven't gotten one good storm started this year! You're starting to mess with the balance of things Jack. Mother Nature is starting to get angry, and if you don't step things up you'll be out of the job"

Jack's stomach dropped at the summer spirit's words, "really?"

"Yes Jack" Notus took a step back, running his hand through his hair "Jack listen, you've been a great winter spirit for years now, much better than Boreas, but if you don't pick things up now. You're going to fade away just like he did. I'm worried about you."

Jack ran his thumb over his staff shamefully, "I know. It's just," he glanced back over to his sister's new home worryingly, he sighed "I'll tell Jessie I have to go as soon as she wakes up and then I'll head south. Just don't make me leave without saying goodbye… Children hate that."

Notus rubbed his temples, obviously seeing that the good bye was more for Jack then for the kids "fine, but you have to leave immediately, and you can't come back up until autumn starts"

"What, no you have to let me visit" Jack said, panic filling him, "I-I mean who's going to watch over her, make sure she's okay?"

"Jack, no buts on this" Notus shouted angrily, making Jack flinch at the heat coming off the spirit "I'll make sure nothing happens to the kids here in Burgess, if I catch any sight of anything wrong, I'll contact the guardians. Just like I always have. You have nothing to worry about, the kids are safe."

"Fine," Jack muttered, giving in to the older spirit, "just, promise me you won't let anything happen to the kids"

Notus took in a deep breath, paused "yes Jack, I promise. Now will you go say bye to the kid so you can get back to work?"

Jack frowned, "but… she's sleeping"

"So then wake her up," Notus said, throwing his hand in the air, "you can do that now, you aren't invisible anymore"

Jack blinked at the spirit, then nodded, "okay, okay" he leaped across the street, over to Jamie's window. He opened the window silently and stepped into the room, walking silently up to his sister's bed side. He was about to reach over and shake her shoulder, when Notus climbed in through the window just as easily as Jack had, despite his size. "What are you doing in here?!" Jack hissed at the Greek summer spirit, placing himself between the spirit and the sleeping child.

"Me? I'm making sure you do as you're told" Notus said, crossing his arms, "it isn't like he can't hear me, just ignore say good bye so we can go"

"Notus I know it's been like, a thousand years since you started doing your job, and I know you weren't exactly human at any point in time." Jack ranted as quietly as he could, "so you have different views and think differently than me, but I can NOT just stand here and pretend that you aren't there. It's awkward as hell."

Both spirits froze, as the child behind them shifted in his bed, rubbing his eyes "Jack? What are doing in here?" the kid said groggily, "who are you talking to?"

"Oh, sorry Jess, I didn't mean to wake you," Jack said turning to the child, "this is the summer spirit, Notus." Jack gestured to the spirit behind him.

Jamie blearily looked at the summer spirit groggily, the summer spirit gave a small wave with his hand, but didn't show anything else "oh" Jamie said, then turned back to Jack, "and why is he here?"

"I'm making Jack go down south for the winter" Notus said "he won't be back till autumn"

"Dude, did you ever hear of easing into a conversation?" Jack said to the summer spirit, then turned back to Jamie, "so eh, yeah. I've got to go; I won't be back for a few months… Notus is going to be watching over you so if anything goes on while I'm not here let him know?"

The ten year old kid rolled his eyes, at the winter spirit, "Jack. I will be fine, really." He turned to Notus, "I'm surprised it's actually taken him this long to kick him back South, I mean you've been here for a week. If you're here, who's making winter down south fun?"

"Hey, that hurts," Jack said pretending to be offended, Notus behind him coughed, "so, yeah I have to leave. Tell everyone bye for me, will you?"

"Yeah, bye" Jamie muttered, rubbing his eyes and laying back down.

Jack and Notus made to leave out the window, but Jack stopped, with on foot on the sill, "Oh, did Bunny drop off your hat?"

"Yes, Jack he did," Jamie moaned pulling the pillow over his face, "now leave. I have school in the morning, and I don't have to be up for another three hours!"

"okay, okay" Jack said, turning back to the window, he took one last glance over his shoulder, before having the wind pull him up into the sky.

* * *

AN: So here is the second chapter.

Notus and Boreas comes from the Greek/Roman names for the southern and Northern winds respectively. I couldn't think of any other 'summer spirits' that I know of. In this fanfiction Boreas is the name of the retired 'old man winter' figure. However they are not like Jack, where at one time they were human. Instead Notus is a full-on spirit created by Mother Nature. So he doesn't think like humans do, which Jack points out in this chapter. He will appear in the next chapter, but he won't be having a major role in things.

I know in the second scene the wording referring to Jamie is a little weird, but I wanted to convey that from Jack's point of view he really thinks that Jamie is his little sister. Who, I have decided to name Jessie, because it is similar to Jamie.


	3. Chapter 3

AN: I do not own rise of the Guardians, or any of the characters in them.

I also do not own the cover art I have used for this story, I found the image on google, and followed it to its tumblr source. However the account that originaly uploaded it is closed, so… yeah. It was uploaded by someone called senaizumi, and if he/she wants me to take the picture down I will.

* * *

North assumed there was a time that Jack would have been terrified of being kidnapped by giant creatures. But as North watched two of his yetis toss the sack onto the ground, and Jack climb out, he realized that to Jack, being grabbed by monsters roughly from behind and shoved into a sack and thrown into a portal had become somewhat of a game.

Or he assumed, since Jack jumped strait back up to his feet, and addressed the Yetis "dude, where did you guys come from? I was on nothing but ice! How did I not see you coming?" the yetis replied in garbled tones, and Jack burst out laughing, "Manny, you guys really are ninjas," Jack said farewell to the yetis and finally turned to North "your special delivery of 'yetis mail' has arrived" Jack did a small bow "so what's up? Did something serious happen?"

"We don't know how serious problem is yet" North said telling a half truth, "however if we do not address it now, things might become worse. Come now everyone is already in meeting room" He led Jack into the big meeting room without further comment.

"Funny, I saw bunny the other day and he didn't mention anything" Jack mused, following the big Russian.

"Things did not come up until late last night," North said solemnly, holding the door to the meeting room open for Jack.

"Thank you," Jack said sitting in his usual spot at the Guardian's meeting table, as far away from the roaring fire as possible, and closest to the window "morning Tooth, Sandy how are things going?"

Sandy waved happily, before turning his attention back to his eggnog "fine" Tooth nervously fiddling with a candy cane, "how are you?"

"Not to good," Jack said, leaning his cane was leaning up against the table, "The summer kicked me out of burgess the other day, I'm not allowed to be in the northern hemisphere until autumn comes, well excluding the arctic circle and Siberia."

"Is that so?" Bunny chuckled "that must have been a sight to see"

"Why would he do that Jack?" North frowned, "he said it was okay for you to visit Jamie and Sophie, did he not"

Jack felt his eye twitched ever so slightly at Jamie's name, and all of the guardians shared a look. "Probably because you've been hanging out there to long," Bunny said disapprovingly, "honestly I would have done it sooner,"

"yeah, well either way I can't stay here to long" Jack said, "cause I am kind of suppose to be grounded to '_winter duties only' _according to Notus. So can we get this meeting going?"

"certainly" North said, clapping his hands, then paused turning to Bunny, who was leaning back in his chair, and had his feet up on the table "Bunny, explain to Jack what Jamie said."

"What? Why do I have to be the one to tell him?!" Bunny said accusingly, glaring at North.

"Because, Bunny" North said, "you explain it better"

Bunny looked like he was about to put up a fight with North, so tooth stepped in "Jack, you might have brain damage" Tooth said, hovering out of her chair nervously.

"Brain damage?" Jack frowned, looking between the four in front of him, looking confused, "why would you think that? And what does this have to do with Jessie?" All of the guardians paused, looking at Jack.

"You mean Jamie?" Bunny said, sitting up in his chair properly, "his name is Jamie not Jessie, Jack"

"Oh, eh slip of the tongue" Jack said, smiling weekly, "what does this have to do with…? Jamie?"

"Jack" tooth cleared her throat, and floated closer to the winter spirit, "Usually when I help people remember large amount of memories, like you did, I do it a bit at a time. Because when the brain is thrown to many of the memories at once, the brain can't process them. If it does it all at once, there is a risk of brain damage" she placed her hand on Jack's shoulder gently, "I didn't bring this up until now, because well you weren't showing symptoms. But… you are now. Jamie… told Bunny last night that you were acting funny last night. And after thinking about it… well have you ever heard of a Confabulation?"

"No," Everyone was quiet, as they all looked at Jack. His eye twitched, and he stood up, "no, I am not. You're… you're lying." Tooth gasped, hovering away from Jack, shock written across her face.

"Jack-" North started, but the younger teen cut him off.

"I DO HAVE NOT DIMENTIA!" Jack roared, surprising all of the Guardians into silence, "there is nothing wrong with me," Jack said evenly, obviously trying not to have another outburst. In the window behind him, North could see the wind picking up and the snow fall growing heavier.

Sandy was the first person to break the silence. He conjured an image of himself, then a bunny, a fairy, a small Santa, and a finally at last a miniature Jack Frost. He grouped the images all together and put them into a frame. He handed the picture to Jack gently. Jack took the picture, and looked at it. Several emotions flickered across his face, and sandy hugged him briefly before letting him go.

"We care about you Jack," North said smoothly, "this is why we tell you this."

Let us help you" Bunnymund hopped toward Jack and held out his paw, slowly as if he was approaching a hurt animal.

Jack looked up from the picture, to Bunny's paw, and then to his face "I- but there isn't anything wrong with me."

"A Confabulation is a memory disruption," Tooth said, looking at the table grimly, "people who have it can't tell the difference between reality or their dreams. They think stuff happened, but it didn't. You can't see it for yourself Jack, but if you don't let us help you, you might end up hurting Jamie"

Jack flinched at the child's name "no. I would never, could never hurt Jessie. I mean- I'd never"

"Jack, Jessie and Jamie are two different people" North said, "I don't know who Jessie is, but Jamie is your best friend, your first believer. Remember what happened with Pitch?"

"Well yeah, Jessie and her friends-"

"Jamie" Bunny said sternly, "_Jamie_ and _his_ friends"

"NO." Jack said, taking a step back from Bunny, "Jessie- they're the same person!" Jack said, raising his voice slightly, "I- you can't see it. But I can. I'm not lying!" he backed away from them all, his eyes filled with confusion.

"Jack, just think on it, will you?" North strode, placing a hand on Bunny's shoulder to keep the Pooka from doing anything rash. He picked up Jack's forgotten cane, and handed it gently back to the winter spirit, "we are here if you need us, understand?"

Jack took his cane gently, and after a second, pocketed the sand photo of them all, before turning and launching himself out of the window, into the growing storm. "So what, we're just going to let him leave!" Bunny said, closing the window harshly, "just like that!?"

"Jack is confused, and feels threatened" North said, "by letting him go, and not making him storm off we have shown him that we are only here to help. We shall let him think, but keep close eyes on him from a distance. Besides, our goal for the meeting was to simply make Jack aware of the danger. Sandy, keep close eye on his dreams will you? Tooth. Prepare to have us walk Jack through his memories, just in case things do turn badly. Bunny, keep an eye on Jamie when you can. In a week I will bring Jack back to the pole and ask him if he wants our help again, maybe convince him to start meditating through his regained memories"

"Well I did promise to visit the ankle bitter," Bunny muttered, "sounds like a plan"

Sandy nodded, his agreement, and then made several sand images, conveying that he had to be off, Tooth had to as well, and so the guardians broke up their meeting, each worrying about their newest member.

* * *

AN: so here is chapter 3, a little shorter then the previous chapters, but it felt right cutting it off here.

I know I said Notus would be appearing in this chapter, but that scene got ousted in the revision stage. Not to say he won't show up later, but the scene I had planned with him, approaching north and telling him how Jack acted weird with Jamie, just seems a little redundant.

for those who were wondering, here is the wiki link for confabulations. yes it is a real thing. i actually found it by googling Jack's 'symptoms' and the name was so funny i couldn't resist adding it in. his symptoms don't match up completely, so he technically might have something else, but i'm not a physiologist or a doctor so i'm not allowed to tell people professionally what is wrong with them. don't sue me

en. wikipedia wiki / Confabulations # Diagnosis_and_treatment


	4. Chapter 4

AN: I do not own Rise of the Guardians, or any of the characters in this story.

I also do not own the cover art I have used for this story, I found the image on Google, and followed it to its tumblr source. However the account that originally uploaded it is closed, so… yeah. It was uploaded by someone called senaizumi, and if he/she wants me to take the picture down I will.

* * *

To say Jack was upset over learning of his 'condition' was to say the least. Over the course of the few days the Southern Hemisphere got some of the worst winter weather that it had in years, blizzards constantly made land fall, the seas churned with ice, several boats sank. North decided to cut the week he wanted to give Jack short when the third ship sank, and there was a death toll. So, being the only two available for the Job, North and Bunnymund headed out after five days to the south pole, intent on either having Jack admit to his problem, or taking the spirit to the tooth palace by force.

"Aster, are you ready to go?" North asked as he adjusted his gloves as the Yetis finished making sure the sleigh was fit for the heavy winter weather they might face.

"Just about" Bunny shouted over the hubbub of the Yetis, as tied a purple sash around his waist. Bunnymund had dressed himself in clothes to protect himself against the cold weather they would be going into. He wore a light green cloak with gold accents, and a red collar that stopped just at his jawline; he also wore black gloves and had wrapped his feet in more leather than usual. The purple sash around his waist was the finishing touch, "ugh," Bunnymund said, as North clambered into the sleigh, he pulled on his holster for his boomerangs over his shoulders, buckling it at the front "I hate wearing this thing, to restricting"

"Then borrow a spare cloak the yettis use for bad storm weather, they are bigger and waterproof as well," North said down at the Pooka, eyeing the very thing material he was wearing "your coat doesn't look like it will do much against cold anyway"

"And have to endure their smell?" Bunny snorted "I'd rather not. True it's thin, but its enchanted just like your cloak" he said, jumping into the sleigh besides North, immediately bracing himself for the ride "won't wear or tear with time, they're water proof, and they'll keep me warm. Kept me alive through more than one ice age; perfect for fighting an ice spirit"

"we are only taking him home," North said sternly "we ask him to come of his own volition before using force."

"says the one who has his minions kidnap him every time we have a meeting?"

"that is different," North shrugged and turned to Yetis beside him "Charles, we are leaving, clear runway" the Yetis beside the sled, nodded then started bellowing to the Yetis around him, North snapped the reigns, and all nine of the reign dear charged forward, pulling the immense sleigh behind them with freakish ease, "Bunny, would appreciate it if you don't scratch paint with claws this time, Yetis tired of repainting" North said over his shoulder, as they charged down the launch ramp at full speed.

"I wouldn't scratch it if you gave me something to hold onto!" Bunny said, looking queasy from his spot in the back of the sleigh, holding onto the wood work for dear life. However soon they had gone through the loop-di-loops and out into the frigid Artic air. North let his steads gain their footing in the air, before throwing a portal for them to fly through. The change was immediate, they went from the relatively calm, bitter air of the North Pole, and appeared strait into a torrential down poor.

The wind hail, slammed into the carriage with in full force, making the sleigh jerk slightly in the Wind. North gritted his teeth, and directed the reindeer up, they were flying blind, going straight into the rain and hail, but soon they hit the clouds, and it was a few minutes of nothing but cold, and wet. If his cloak hadn't been enchanted to be water proof, he would have been soaked to the bone and freezing to death by the time they made it through the cloud cover. Up above the clouds, was a stark contrast to the storm below. The Sun was blinding, with nothing above the carriage but the last few layers of the atmosphere, shinning down onto the sea of dark clouds around them. However the sun's presence didn't take away the cold, or the chilling wind that lashed at their faces from all directions. A fact that had North's teeth chattering, as they continued to skim the cloud cover.

"you okay?" Bunnymund asked, hopping up from the seat in his back, and approaching North, however keeping a hand on the side to keep himself steady. The floor of the sleigh was coated water, making the trip hazardous. North took a moment to examine his friend, completely dry and seemingly unaffected by the freezing temperatures around them.

"I'm glad you brought cloak, otherwise you would look like a drowned rat by now" North said, gritting his teeth, against the cold while clearing his standing spot of hail "maybe you could show me enchantment, my cloak may shed water but that doesn't keep the cold out."

Bunnymund merely shrugged "sure I don't see why not," he frowned, looking over at the deer, "are the reindeer going to be okay? They aren't going to go into shock from the cold, are they?"

"we take them out in similar weather at Pole all the time" North said, "for conditioning and training. They will be fine, so long as we don't stay in rain for long periods of rime. Now let us locate our wayward friend and bring him home." North handed the reigns over to Bunnymund, and took out a small device from his cloak. North had made the devise to track Jack's magical signature, since Jack always had to be on the move and couldn't always tell the others where he would be. If he wanted to, he could also use it to locate any of the other guardians, but they were usually either in their bases or easy to find so he didn't use it often for them.

"so that's how your yetis always know where he is?" Bunny frowned looking at the device "that's a little creepy"

"it is necessary," north said, shrugging "Jack is always on move, how else are we to find him? Jack is that way, off the coast by a few miles" He traded the tracker for the sleigh reins from the Pooka, and directed the reindeer toward the winter spirit, "tell me if he starts moving"

"Doesn't look like he is," Bunny said, bracing himself against the side of the sleigh, "though it doesn't say what altitude"

"Yes, it cannot tell height" North replied, "only where he is located. how close are we?"

"We should be on him any second," Bunny said, putting the tracker in a pocket of his coat, before turning his attention to the sky around him. There was nothing but the clouds beneath them and the sun above them, beating down on the swirling mass below them.

"Do you think he's below the clouds?" North asked. Then a crack of lightning sounded from below, making them both of them start, and the air around them vibrate as the clouds beneath them flashed. The reindeer reared back in fear, jerking the carriage away from the storm below.

"If there is thunder I do not fancy going down there" North grunted, bringing his animals back under control then circling the carriage around in wide circles, squinting at the dark clouds below. He noticed that Bunnymund was no longer standing next to him, and looked at the giant Pooka on the floor beside him, gripping the side railing and bench for dear life. North couldn't help but laugh.

"Oh shut up" Bunny growled up at his friend, gripping the side of sled for dear life, he paused "well then what do we do?"

North paused, before taking all of the reigns in one hand, cupping his mouth with the other and shouting "JACK! JACK FROST!"

"oh like that's going to work!" Bunny snapped,

"who's- what the heck are you guys doing here?" North gave Bunny a look of triumph, as the spirit of winter floated up from the clouds. He looked confused and wary however when he saw Bunnymund, sitting on the floor of the sled gripping the rail with a death grip, he burst out laughing.

"oh laugh it up!" Bunny said, "not everyone can fly you know, falling is a very really possibility!"

"I know, I know" Jack calmed down, wiping a tear away, easily keeping up with the sleigh as the reign deer pulled the sleigh thorough the air, "it's just… what the heck are you wearing? You look like some kind of monk warrior."

"it keeps me from freezing to death," Bunny grumbled, "and it's a good thing too, what with this storm you've conjured up"

"well, yeah that's kinda my job" Jack said landing on the edge of the sleigh, "not my fault you and North decided to come here for a Sunday drive"

"Jack, you have ice all over you!" North observed, and in fact the teen did. His hoodie, pants had been soaked through with the rain and hail, and frozen into icicles on his arms and legs, even his hair was frozen into spikes.

"What? Oh, yeah" Jack said looking down at himself "that happens sometimes."

"Aren't you cold?" Bunnymund asked quietly, looking at the ice covering the boy's body

"well yeah, but don't forget to me cold is good." Jack reminded "it's like; the colder I am the better I feel, but any kind of heat bothers me. Like hot chocolate, I hate warm drinks. Warm makes my skin crawl. Though the ice sometimes does get annoying"

"Yeah, well the rest of the world doesn't much like being frozen to death," bunny said, "so what's with all these storms you're making?"

Jack looked down at the Pooka and frowned "I'm just doing my job. Just the usual."

"Jack, this" North gestured to the storm around them "is not normal south American weather. Now I know you're bothered by what came to light a few days ago, but you should not let your emotions affect your work so much"

"And what do you know about weather? I'm kind of in charge of it" Jack said, pointing to himself "if I decide to make it rain I will."

"People have died, Jack" Bunnymund said, standing up "because you can't accept the truth. Stop this- this denial phase and let us help you"

"I do not have a problem!" Jack said, steadily, "I am perfectly fine." And _you" _jack said vehemently, approaching Bunnymund _"_have no right to come here and tell me how to do my job."

"stop it, the both of you!" North demanded, tying the reigns to the dash board to keep the sleigh steady. He stepped between the Pooka and the spirit. "this arguing is helping no one"

"I don't need help" Jack said taking a step back from the two "I was alone for three centuries, and I was doing my job just fine. I help save the world with you guys one time and I have to do _my_ job the way _you_ see fit. I don't tell you how to make toys, or you to paint eggs. Why should you get any say?"

"we don't have brain damage," Bunny said, "and then go off and kill people because we're in denial"

"I AM NOT IN DENIAL!" Jack yelled, brow knitting in anger "I don't know where you guys go that idea, but there is NOTHING wrong with me. And if you haven't noticed"

"Then what's Jamie Bennett's favorite color?" bunny demanded

"It's green, what does that have to do with anything?" Jack said, throwing his hands up in the air in frustration.

"Because its RED" Bunny said, "You and Jamie had a whole argument four days ago that it was green instead of red. And the whole thing started because you remember him asking for a toy, that he never asked for"

"But she did ask for that horse," Jack said, "the previous week at dinner, I know because dad was able to eat with us that night and he asked us what she wanted for her birthday! But then dad couldn't make it to her birthday, so I made it for her"

"Jack, Jamie is a boy," North said gently, "you are confusing the present with the past." He placed a hand on the ice spirit's shoulder "Jamie's parents can't see you. They are adults, the way you are remembering things is not the way they actually happened. But it isn't your fault; we can help you remember things correctly, just trust us"

"NO" Jack said throwing North's hand off of his shoulder. He took a step back and looked at the two guardians in front of him "Jessie is a girl, not a boy, I think I would know. She's my SISTER. We did have dinner with our parents and she did ask for that toy. And I had to make it for her because DAD DIED!" Jack breathed in a sharp breath, as if something had just struck him over the wind pipe. He held his hand up to his throat, and took a step back ward, clutching his chest. Both North and Bunny reached out to catch the spirit, but he regained his balance, looking at the two with watery eyes. "And I don't have to stand here and listen to you two spout nonsense!" Jack said, taking a step back to the edge of the sleigh, cane in hand.

"oh no you don't" the Australian growled, and shot forward. He grabbed Jack's arm to keep him from going.

"let go of me!" jack said, swinging his staff at the Pooka. Bunnymund caught the staff before it hit him, and turned his wrist. Jack winced, and let go of the staff, which clattered to the ground of the sleigh "NO!" Jack shouted, diving for the wooden stick. The six foot Pooka, with ease, wrapped his left arm around jack's middle and hauled him upward and toward the back of the sleigh. Jack, with his free arm, pulled a thick icicle hanging off of his elbow, and drove it toward the rabbit's shoulder. However as soon as the ice touched the green fabric on the giant's shoulder it turned instantly into water, and rolled off the fabric. Jack gave a cry of frustration.

"enchanted clothing mate," Bunny grunted, as Jack's feet made contact with his stomach. However he ignored the blow and continued walking "your ice isn't going to do anything against me."

"we'll see about that," Jack hissed, almost like a cat, before raising his free hand again. Ice formed around his fingers, making sharp points at the end of his fingers, and drove his newly clawed hands toward the Pooka's head. North, seeing Jack's attack, grabbed the child's wrist, and yanked kept it from making a hole in his old friend's head.

"Jack stop, we are trying to help you!" North said, giving one last attempt for the kid to see reason.

Jack looked up at him, and North was stuck by the defiance and hatred that was in the snow flaked irises looking at him "there is nothing wrong with me" he said, voice even and filled with venom. An immense, sapping cold suddenly shot through North's hands, and North found that his glove was suddenly caked in an inch of ice, which was growing from the boy's skin and onto North's arm.

North grabbed Jack's arm with his free hand, and pried his now numb hand away from Jack's arm, breaking the ice with a sickening crunch. "Then I am sorry about this" North said, helped Bunnymund wrestle Jack's arms behind his back. Bunnymund took off the purple sash he had tied around his waist, and used it to secure Jack's arms to his sides, and his wrists behind his back. they used North's own belt to buckle the kid's legs together, to keep him from kicking. Jack fought them the whole time spitting curses and struggling to let himself free, but after his limbs had been pinned together, and they had kept him from rolling out of the sleigh by having Bunnymund sit on his back, he lapsed into silence, and merely glared at the dashboard for the silent trip to the tooth palace.

* * *

AN: The cloak/robe Bunnymund is wearing in this chapter is what it looks like he wears in the book _The Guardians of Childhood _by William Joyce, which (for those who don't know) the movie is based off of. I was originally going to have Sandy and north collect Jack, because Bunny and Tooth obviously can't withstand the cold. However Jack had to argue with someone, and North _and_ Sandy just didn't fit the bill because North is the one trying to reason with Jack in this story, and well Sandy is mute (obviously). So instead I came up with the enchanted clothes idea. (If video games can have frost-resistant clothes so can Pookas)

The image of Bunnymund's 'clothes' is on his wiki page:

riseoftheguardians. wikia.

Com / wiki / E. _Aster _ Bunnymund


	5. Chapter 5

AN: I do not own Rise of the Guardians, or any of the characters in this story.

I also do not own the cover art I have used for this story, I found the image on Google, and followed it to its tumblr source. However the account that originally uploaded it is closed, so… yeah. It was uploaded by someone called senaizumi, and if he/she wants me to take the picture down I will.

Speech in memories will be italicized, as well as some thoughts.

* * *

The sleigh landed in the Tooth palace with a metal scrape that made all of her fairies wince. Tooth hovered closer to the sleigh, nervously wringing her hands, a cloud of fairies following her "is her here? Did you find him? Is he okay?" she bombarded North with questions as He tied the reigns to the dash board.

The Russian sighed, and rubbed his brow, "he is here, but…" he turned, as Bunny, wearing a green coat stepped out of the sleigh, a very angry looking Jack slung over his shoulder. Tooth took in the purple sash and belt Jack was hog-tied with, and fluttered over to him.

"Oh, Jack" she said, a hand over her mouth "I'm so sorry, this is all my fault…" North walked over, and placed a reassuring hand on her shoulder, "but don't worry, we'll fix you up"

"Don't touch him" Bunny warned to her and the fairies that were hovering behind Tooth, looking worried, "everything that does tends to freeze"

"let me go" Jack said murderously, "and maybe I wouldn't do that"

"Jack, this is for your own good, whether you believe us or not" North said, quietly as he picked Jack's staff out of the sleigh.

"more like brainwash" Jack said, spitefully.

"okay, where do you want him?" Bunnymund said, turning to Tooth.

"this way" Tooth said, and left the landing platform, heading deeper into her keep. She brought them across several floating walkways, and into a round room with salmon walls and a single piece of furniture, what looked like a dentist table inside it, but without all the equipment.

"we're gonna need a way to hold him down" Bunnymund said, looking at the chair and then back to the Fairy, "something that won't go brittle if frozen,"

"Uh, right" Tooth said, wringing her hands, she turned to her minions "go get something will you? And bring me his teeth, someone get Sandy as well, please?" the tiny fairies nodded, and then left the room quickly. Tooth turned back around to find that Bunnymund had placed Jack on the chair however still kept him tied up, "couldn't we- eh- untie him or something? I mean it's not like he's going to try and do anything"

"oh he'll try something alright" Bunnymund said, irritably "the little bugger tried to give me a third ear whole when we grabbed him"

"what, its suddenly illegal to defend myself when I'm being kidnapped?" Jack spat, struggling to sit up, but not being able to, because of his bonds, "because that's what this is, kidnapping. Mother Nature's going to have my head if I don't get back to work!" he threw back his head and shouted "HELP SOMEONE HELP, THESE CREEPS HAVE ME LOCKED UP!" He then tried to struggle out of his bonds, to no avail.

"Stop it or I'll shove North's socks in your mouth," Bunnymund warned, keeping Jack firmly in the chair with a gloved hand "and this isn't kidnapping, this is incarceration because you've lost your mind"

"Bunny!" Tooth scolded "he hasn't lost his mind; he's just having some memory trouble,"

"I'm going to have to agree with Bunny on this one" North said, earning a nasty look from Tooth, "what? He thinks Jamie is his sister!"

"Jessie!" Jack said, angrily, "Her name is Jessie!" he froze for a second, starring wide eyed at North "my god" he said quietly, as if having an epiphany "you have her don't you?"

"have her?" Tooth said, worryingly, looking between Jack and North "have who?"

North didn't get a chance to explain, as Jack exploded, beside them "LET HER GO NOW YOU FREAKS! GIVE ME BACK MY SISTER!" he screamed, then started shouting profanity at the three of them.

"whoa, stop it!" Bunnymund said, struggling to keep the enraged spirit on the chair, "where the heck are those restraints?!"

"JESSIE!?" Jack yelled "JESSIE I'M COMING, JUST HANG ON I'M-!" Jack's yelling was cut short by a ball of yellow sand, thrown by Sandy from the front of the door. Jack, now unconscious, slumped down into the chair.

"Sandy" Bunnymund sighed with relief, "I can't say I've been so glad to see you in my life"

Sandy gave Bunnymund a small salute, and then floated into the room, conjuring a question mark, and gesturing to Jack.

"You know as much as I do" Tooth admitted, the rest of her fairies returned at that point, some holding rope, and one carrying a Tooth canister, "oh! Good, you all are back" she took the teeth, while Bunnymund and North took the rope and tied Jack firmly to the chair. Tooth fluttered around to the back of the chair, carrying the Tooth case. She opened the Tooth case, and started putting the individual teeth, one by one into individual slots. Then she placed several wires onto Jack's temples, and forehead, all the time muttering to herself.

"so what exactly does this machine do?" North asked, as she worked.

"this machine," Tooth explained, "will allow Jack to have an omnificent view of his memories. Particularly the ones his brain are having trouble processing"

"So Jack's basically going to watch a movie?" Bunny asked, tying his sash back on.

"Well, us and him" Tooth said, "we are basically going to walk him through his memories, try to get him to process what happened in each memory,"

"right, so we're all going to watch a movie together," Bunny restated bluntly, "and the movie is Jack's memories."

Tooth rolled her eyes "yes Bunny, but it's a _lot_ more complicated than that, but yes. Okay all the teeth are in… now everyone put on one of these…" she pulled several headsets out of a shelf in the wall, and handed each of the guardians one, "these will connect you to Jack's subconscious, and to all of us as well. Just put them on and get comfy," she handed one to Sandy, who put it on and gave her a thumbs up. As Several of her fairies brought in cushions for them to sit on.

"wait, how many times have you tested this?" Bunnymund asked, examining the black plastic in his hand "I don't want to accidently end up stuck in Frost's head"

"Bunny," Tooth said, sighing, handing "they're video goggles, nothing else, which brings me to my second point, it will look like we're in his memory, but we are still physically in this room, so don't move around inside the memory too much, Jack will be able to move around more freely, because it's his memory, but we are limited physically."

"Don't get up? Got it," North said, adjusting the head piece, then sitting down on one of the cushions. Sandy summoned a small sand cloud to float on, sitting on it lotus style, Bunny put the headset on with a huff, and laid down on his stomach, paws out in front of him, picking at his sleeve. Tooth and North got comfy on the cushions the Baby Tooth's had brought in.

The door to the room closed and the light flickered off; leaving the four of them side-by-side, facing the unconscious Jack in the chair. "Ready guys?" Tooth asked, when all of her fellow guardians nodded, she adjusted her mike and cleared her voice "alright, Baby Tooth, initialize sequence" the light in the room shut off without a sound, and each of the guardian's vision went dark.

* * *

All five guardians appeared in a black abyss as if they had just decided to blink into existence. four sitting comfortably in a line, all facing the fifth guardian, who was standing in front of them, unbound and holding his cane. The white haired boy blinked at them looking around, "Jack," Tooth greeted stiffly.

"You!" Jack said, pointing accusingly at them, then paused, and looked off to the side as if confused, "I'm mad at you. I don't know why, but I should… be?" he said uncertainly.

"you have no reason to be angry Jack," Tooth said calmly, ignoring Bunny's snort beside her, "listen, your confused"

"my head feels fuzzy," Jack said turning to examine the blackness surrounding them "where are we?"

"your subconscious," Tooth explained, "we all are, because your brain still hasn't processed your memories, completely. It's been causing you to slowly lose touch of reality, so we are here to fix that"

"you've gone crazy, and we're here to fix you up" Bunny said lightly, North reached over and smacked the Pooka on the back of his head "ow- what was that for?!"

"ignore him" North said, glaring at Bunny for a second, before gesturing for his feathered friend to continue.

"so," she said, sitting up a bit more "we are going to help you process some of your regained memories"

"oh" Jack said, scrunching up his nose "wait, why is Bunny wearing clothes?"

"not the point Jack" Tooth said, waving her arm to regain Jack's attention, and she had thought he had a short attention span normally, it was even worse when Jack's thoughts were muddled by unprocessed memories, "we are going to walk you through your memories, to help you get better do you understand?" she said while she had his attention

"yeah, wait. no" Jack said, "wait does this mean you all are in my head?" Jack put his hand on his mouth, "oh, gross, what if you all get stuck in here? That would be horrible"

"Jack this is serious," North said, raising his eyebrow, "and no we are not in your head, but in your memories."

"my memories?" Jack said, looking above their heads, starring off into space, "like the ones I remembered from my teeth?"

"yes! Those exact memories Jack" Tooth said, glad to be back on track, "listen, we are all going to see some with you, all you do is tell us what is happening, or how you feel about them as they are going on, understand?"

"sounds simple enough" Jack said, frowning, "and we're doing this because Bunny's wearing clothes?" Tooth mentally face palmed, and was even more appalled when Sandy next to her gave Jack a thumbs up. Bunnymund looked like he was about to get up and strangle Jack, and North was laughing to Hard "yes, yes we are" Tooth said, grimacing and going with the flow, _honestly why did she have to work with a bunch of immature boys, was one other female guardian too much to ask for?_ "so are we going to get started of what? my heads really fuzzy and I don't like it… let's free Bunny from the clothes,"

"right, let's start with the first Memory then" Tooth said, ignoring all of her immature, or shot tempered coworkers. _I should have just made them wait outside._ Tooth thought, as their black surroundings began to gain colors and shapes. Soon it the guardians were in a small, single roomed house, with a kitchen and dining table in one corner, and some beds against the other wall.

"hey, this is my house!" Jack said, perking up, and walking around the obviously familiar surroundings, he excitedly explored the space, a huge grin on his face. Suddenly a Woman and a Man faded into the room, both with brown hair and thin, wiry frames just like Jack. Jack froze, and stared at the two adults, "These are my parents!" Jack said happily, approaching them.

"This is only a memory, Jack" Tooth reminded the boy, drawing his attention, again, "tell us what you're feeling as the memory plays out."

The door to the small lodge burst open suddenly, and a small boy with brown eyes and hair ran into the house _"Mom? Dad? Guess what?! the lake is frozen over, that means we can go skating again soon, right?" _the thin woman, who had been sewing looked up and smiled, _"yes Jack but we have to wait till the ice is thick enough,"_ Jack's dad said sternly, to his son, _"if the ice isn't thick enough, you'll fall thought and freeze to death"_

"by the moon that's me!" Jack said, somehow bringing his voice to an impossible Pitch on the last word, "look at me, I'm so adorable!"

_"no come here, we need to talk to you about something" _Mr. Frost said, gesturing for his son to come sit with him at the wooden table he was sitting at. Young Jack approached slowly, _"I didn't do anything, did I?"_ Mr. Frost laughed and made pulled his son closer to him, _"I don't know, did you do something wrong?" "Not that I can think of"_ the small boy said warily. _"Stop teasing him, honey" _Jack's mom spoke up for the first time, _"Jack you didn't do anything wrong, me and your dad just have some great news to tell you"_

"hey, I remember this memory" Jack said, jumping up onto one of the beds with ease, watching the memory intently.

_"What is it then?"_ young Jack said looking between his mother and father, _"well honey"_ Mrs. Frost said, placing he sewing down, _"you might be getting a new sibling soon,"_ young Jack's face went through a variety of emotions, but he settled of overjoy, and jumped up from the table _"yes! I'm getting a brother! Oh this is going to be so awesome, we're going to play together, and have secret passwords, and we could go skating together as well!" "It's going to be a few more years before your sibling is old enough to do those things"_ Mr. Frost said, chuckling, _"besides, who knows, you might just get a sister?" "A sister?!"_ young Jack said, possibly looking even happier, _"really? Like I'll get to make her dresses and-" "Yes, yes. However we don't know if it's a boy or girl yet. only God knows what he has planned for us, so it will be a while until…_"slowly the three humans faded out, and soon the guardians were surrounded by the darkness again.

"you have no idea how exited I was to be getting a sibling" Jack said; eyes distant and still fondly looking at the spot the memory had occurred in, "around where I lived there weren't much children, and even the ones who were there didn't like me all that much. I was the runt of the small town, all the other boys teased me because I was to girly or weird… learning that I was going to have a sibling, someone to talk to other than my mother and father, I was so… exited." Jack lapsed into silence, obviously thinking about things, and the guardians let him. After a few minutes he blinked, and looked back at the others, "so… onto the next memory?"

* * *

AN: and that is chapter 5, wow onto chapter six already? I can hardly believe it!

The next few chapters are going to be like this, Jack reliving memories from his child hood, and the other's thoughts on them. Most of them (as most of you can probably guess) will be involving him and his sister, though there might be some other memories mixed in.


	6. Chapter 6

AN: I do not own Rise of the Guardians, or any of the characters in this story.

I also do not own the cover art I have used for this story, I found the image on Google, and followed it to its tumblr source. However the account that originally uploaded it is closed, so… yeah. It was uploaded by someone called senaizumi, and if he/she wants me to take the picture down I will.

Speech in memories will be italicized, as well as some thoughts.

* * *

The next memory also took place in the small lodge that use to be Jack's home. Younger Jack was sitting on the bed next to the fire, knitting what looked like was going to be a blanket, while his mother, now showing signs of the baby growing inside her, made stew at the fire pit.

_"Hey, mum?"_ Jack said, not looking up from his work as he counted stitches, _"how are babies made?"_

Bunny burst out laughing, at the younger's questions. Jack turned on him, blushing "shut up!" he yelled, "I was like 8! It's a reasonably question, that any kid ask when his mom is pregnant!"

"How can I NOT laugh?!" Bunny said, sitting up on his haunches and gesturing to the memory "you're about to get the 'talk'!" North at this remark, covered his mouth and looked away from all of them, shoulder's shaking.

"Not you too!" Jack said, throwing his hands up.

_"Well Jack,"_ Mrs. Frost said, turning to her son, wiping her hand on her apron, the memory continued despite the Guardian's small fight ensuing on beside them, _"you know how horses and cows breed_?" the younger nodded, pausing in his work to look up at his mom, _"it works the same way for all of god's creatures, even us humans," _younger Jack blinked then frowned _"but that- that so gross. I mean- I think it would hurt whoever I'm doing it with more than anything else!"_ "_That's why you only are supposed to do it with your wife,"_ Mrs. Frost said, turning back to her work _"and in mutual agreement with them" "doesn't matter if we both agree to do it, it seems disgusting, and I could never do that to my wife!" _Young Jack said taking a vow of celibacy. Mrs. Frostlaughed _"well then I guess you aren't going to have any children"_

"Really?!" Bunnymund said, bursting out, in laughter again, "oh Manny does this mean you're a _virgin?_" beside him North let out a snort and tried to muffle his laughing, but failed to do so.

"Yes," Jack was still blushing, but looking angry, "and I am not ashamed to admit so. It isn't like I ever married anyone, and I _won't _be doing it until I do."

"Good for you Jack" Tooth said "_some_ people have forgotten how marriage works, and I for one applaud you."

"Oh, like you're one to talk" Bunnymund said, earning a smack on the head from Sandy, who gave both Bunny and North a scolding look. The two withered under the fallen star's gaze, as the next memory faded into view.

This time, instead of being in the small house the memory took place outdoors, in a wooded forest. Young Jack was trudging through the snow, carrying a small, bent stick half under a thick dark cloak and dragging a sled behind him. He breathed out a puff of air, sending ice crystals floating around his brown hair. He squinted off into the snowy distance, as if looking for something.

"no. no, don't" Jack said, suddenly panicking, stepping in front of his younger self, "turn around, go home!"

However the younger Jack ignored him, and walked strait past his older self, and kept on trudging through the snow, the kid stayed in one place however, the projection of the memory keeping the observing guardians a constant distance from the younger Jack. The sound of a stick breaking broke in the distance ahead, and Young Jack dropped the sled lead and dove quickly behind a fallen tree. There was a long moment of silence, where no one moved. Then, slowly and silently, the young Jack reached around to his back, and pulled out a single arrow. He took out the oddly shaped stick, from his cloak, which revealed it to be a small bow. Young Jack silently notched the arrow, and looked over the log, for the source of the sound. After a few seconds a small deer, a doe, slowly walked into a father off clearing, pawing the white snow with its nose. Young Jack froze, not making any movement to give him away. Slowly the deer got closer, looking for grass to graze on, ears pivoting to catch the slightest sound of anyone hunting it. The dear finally uncovered something to graze on, and started to nibble on it. Young Jack, seeing his chance coming took a deep breath, and drew the bow back all the way. He soundlessly rose from his crouch bow aimed at the dear's head, however before he could let his arrow fly, the small doe was struck in the eye with another arrow. The deer let out a haunted scream, before falling over, dead. Young Jack just stood there, eyes wide in shock, his own bow still drawn.

"No! Don't just stand there!" Older Jack said, breaking the silence, begging to his smaller self "run!"

Suddenly, an adult Native American came out from behind a tree across the clearing, holding his own bow, notched with another arrow. Without saying anything, he aimed at the small kid, and let loose another Arrow. The adult didn't miss, shooting Younger Jack in the shoulder, the shaft stopped halfway thought the child, who screaming, grabbing the hurt area with one hand.

All of the Guardians immediately jumped to their feet, instincts to protect the child in front of them kicking in, however they stayed where they were, knowing it what they were witnessing was only an illusion. Jack sat, crouched beside his younger self, trying to get the child to get up and moving, in a panic "you can't stay here! Come on get up! He's comin-" Jack looked up, visibly paling when he saw that the Indian was now standing over both him and the younger version of himself.

The Native American drew a stone hatched in one hand, and raised it, looking down at the child, no expression on his face what-so-ever, the man said in his native tongue, and reached down for Jack. Younger Jack screamed, and rolled away from his attacker. Jack slid down the small hill, and struggled to his feet. The Man turned and started walking for the younger Jack, and older Jack tried to tackle the man, with a strangled yell, "NO!" however, since this was only a memory, he jumped strait through the man, landing in the snow in front of his younger self. Young Jack had stood up again, and now stood, facing the Man in front of him. He let out an uneven breath, his breath condescending in front of his face. Without hesitation, he drew another one of his arrows, and aimed it at the man in front of him, despite the pain in his shoulder "stay back!" the kid shouted, his drawn bow shaking slightly. The man paused, reached for his own bow; however before he could grab it, young Jack let his arrow lose. The smaller arrow imbedded itself in the man's chest, and the man fell to his knees, clutching his chest, where the tuft of feathers was sticking out from his chest. Younger Jack drew and released two more arrows, one landing again in the man's chest, the other striking the man's face.

All of the guardians stood, aghast as Young Jack slowly approached the corpse. The young boy was shaking slightly now, as he starred down at the blood pooling under the man in front of him. His hand crept to his own shoulder, and examined the arrow imbedded there. The shaft had broken when Jack had rolled, but the wood was still sticking through his shoulder. Younger Jack put his bow down on the log, and taking out a knife from beneath his cloak. He made a cleaner cut on the shaft, and reached around his injured shoulder, and took several deep breaths, before wrenching the rest of the shaft out of his shoulder. The boy curled in on himself, breathing deeply for several minutes, hands shaking. He dropped the arrow that had injured him to the ground, and took off the thin scarf he was wearing, wrapping his shoulder, before picking up his bow again. The child didn't look at the man he had killed, only turned to the deer the older man had killed. Trudged back to the sled he had abandoned earlier, and pulled it up to the deer's corpse. With a mighty heave, the child managed to push the deer onto the sled. He then began to drag the game in the direction he had come from, slowly fading into the darkness of Jack's memories.

"Jack," Tooth said softly, taking flight to hover close to the young spirit who was now, curled up inside himself.

"Just- don't say anything," Jacks voice came out uneven and ragged, "just- just… don't"

"It was self-defense" North said quietly, "I would have done the same thing in your position"

"No, it isn't okay!" Jack said, looking up at the guardians, with several tears on his face "its- I killed him; and what's worse is that I didn't feel anything when I did. Killing is wrong, and it should be something that weighs on you conscious, because it's a sin. But when I kill people, I don't feel it. And that's wrong. Like those fishermen that I killed, I know they were killed because of me, but I don't feel anything. But I should. And it's wrong. And- I keep trying to make sure it never happens again, but then there's a car accident or a person caught in a storm, and it's just so hard, to feel and to care when I'm an agent of death."

Sandy floated over to Jack, looking reassuring. He conjured a snow flake, and then after that a globe. He then conjured a sun, a leaf, a flower, then another snow flake, and had them hover around the globe for a second, before making them all disappear. A tombstone was the next conjured image, then a picture of a sick person, someone dying of the heat, and another being crushed by rocks, side by side. After the people had been 'killed' they turned into small angles and disappeared. A clock appeared, ticking last, and Sandy gave him a look that asked gently "do you understand?"

Jack frowned, wiping the water from his cheeks "I-I don't think I understand…"

"What Sandy is trying to say," North said, placing himself next to Jack "is that you are an elemental spirit, Jack. And as such it is your job to bring change to the world. And death is often a result of change. So you see the deaths that you create are in fact part of your work, albeit an unpleasant one. This aloofness you feel is part of your nature, and not a sign that you are a bad person."

"But I kill people!" Jack cried, "how does that make me a good person? I mean technically I'm as bad as- no worse than Pitch. I mean he doesn't even kill people for a living."

"Do you kill people in cold blood?" Bunnymund asked seriously crossing his arms, "Do you enjoy seeing them die? Do you torcher them before killing them?"

"No wha-" Jack said, but Bunnymund cut him off.

"Then you aren't a bad person Jack" Bunnymund said softly, "Because that's what bad spirits do. You've met Notus, the summer spirit right?"

"Well, yeah?" Jack sniffed

"Is he a bad person?" North asked, seeing where Bunny was going, and deciding to help.

"Well- he's a little uptight, but no, not bad"

"His heat kills people too," Bunny said, and North nodded, "people have heat strokes all the time, some die of dehydration, heat breeds mosquitos which spread diseases. The list carries on. But the point is that he kills just as many people as you do Jack"

"And is he a bad person?" North repeated the question, looking pointedly at Jack.

"No," Jack said thoughtfully.

Sandy conjured the picture he had made for Jack of all the guardians earlier that week, he handed the image back to Jack. Jack took the sand picture frame, and ran his hand over the picture "thank you," he said, hugging it like a teddy bear to his chest.

"Jack, we can take a break if you want," Tooth suggested, hovering back into Jack's field of view.

"No," Jack said "we… should keep going, something tells me we shouldn't stop till we finish"

"If you say so," Tooth said, as the next memory started to fade into view around them "but we can stop anytime you want, just say the word"

* * *

AN: Yikes, talk about a short chapter. I added the memory of Jack's 'first kill', because I wanted to explore and expand Jack's character a little bit for this story. Besides Jack isn't just dealing with the memories of his younger sister, but all of the memories his brain hasn't processed yet, so there are going to be a few that don't involve his sister in here, though the majority of them will be. i'm going to try and to two memories for each chapter, up till the end. by that estimate it's going to be 4 chapters of memories, then the end chapters. so 6 more chapters. we're halfway through!


	7. Chapter 7

AN: I do not own Rise of the Guardians, or any of the characters in this story.

I also do not own the cover art I have used for this story, I found the image on Google, and followed it to its tumblr source. However the account that originally uploaded it is closed, so… yeah. It was uploaded by someone called senaizumi, and if he/she wants me to take the picture down I will.

Speech in memories will be italicized. Footnote = *

* * *

"Jack, we can take a break if you want," Tooth suggested, hovering back into Jack's field of view.

"No," Jack said "we… should keep going, something tells me we shouldn't stop till we finish"

"If you say so," Tooth said, as the next memory started to fade into view around them "but we can stop anytime you want, just say the word"

The five of them found themselves standing in the middle of a small church, with the pew filled to the brim with people. The parson at the front of the room was in the middle of a passionate speech, holding the attention of the small population of burgess in rapture.

"Hey," Jack said taking in the church around them, "this is like, a two years after the last memory. What gives? The last few were weeks apart"

"We're mostly going over memories that your brain is having trouble processing," Tooth said, shrugging, "and really emotional memories that you might be having problems coping with. I guess you don't have any problems up till this point in your memories"

"Oh" Jack said frowning, "why are we doing this again?"

"I didn't know you were religious" North changed the subject, as he examined the memory around them.

"I'm not," Jack said shrugging "but going to church was a requirement back in the 1700s. if you didn't go everyone thought you were some evil possessed spirit, and didn't talk to you" Jack leaped into one of the back rows of the pews, perching right in front of his younger self, "hey, I remember this drawing" eyeing a doodle of a rabbit his younger self was drawing. He showed the doodle to a little two-year-old girl right next to him, who had similar brown hair and eyes to the human Jack.

All of the guardians were immediately struck with how akin she looked to Jamie Bennett. The hair and gender were obviously different. But the facial structure and the eyes were exactly the same. Even down to the small mole on the right side of their cheek. The Jamie-look-a-like smiled at his photo, and their father beside them scowled disapprovingly at them both making the two of them turned her attention back to the priest, looking guilty.

"I'm guessing this is your sister," Bunny frowned, "Jessie, right?"

"Yeah," Jack said smiling proudly at the little girl, "I think she's almost three in this memory"

"She looks so much like Jamie" Tooth whispered in awe, "I can see how you'd mistake her for him"

"Mistake her for whom?" Jack said frowning, looking over at the Fairy.

The Service ending saved the guardians from Jack's confusion, as Jack's family walked out with the rest of the members of the church.

Younger Jack grabbed Jessie's hand, and quickly started dragging her off, _"come on, Jessie! Let's go find some eggs!"_ younger Jack said excitingly, jumping up and down. The two ran off into the side yard of the church, what was to later become the park of Burgess. Jessie was the first to find a bright colored egg out of the two "_Look Jack, an eggie!"_ the girl said happily, holding up the brightly painted egg. Jack took the egg from her and smiled, examining the artfully painted egg, "wow, _it must take the Easter Bunny ages to paint all of these._" There was a condescending snort behind the two, and they turned to find a teenage boy, a few years older than Jack, standing behind them. "_The Easter Bunny?_" he said, crossing her arms "_there's no such thing_." Jack frowned, stepping between his sister and the teenage boy in front of him, "_Mike, he is too!_" he gave the boy a hard look. But Mike continued, "_no such thing, the adults paint and hide the eggs_" Mike said smirking "_you still believe in him? Grow up already Jack. You're 10 for god's sake_"

_"The Easter Bunny is real_" Jessie said angrily stomping her foot at the boy; and suddenly the memory around them crackled, and changed. It became a small yard, with Jamie holding a sleigh and addressing the twins "_you guys will believe anything_" one of the twins laughed, walking away as Sophie jumped down the steps.

"What happened?" Bunny said watching as the kids ran off, and Sophie started crying, "Why aren't we in the 1700's?"

"Yeah- what's happening" Jack said, looking around at the kids, looking confused. "Why did Jessie suddenly become 11?"

All of the guardians froze, looking at Jack. "Jack," North said gently, "that isn't Jessie. That's Jamie"

"What?" Jack looked over at the kid, now in the middle of a snow ball fight, and squinted, "oh, your… right that isn't her, that Jamie. Why are we suddenly here?"

"This must be what's causing the confabulations" Tooth said quickly, looking at the memory around them, "The brain damage is making Jack's brain link the wrong memories together, because of the similarities between Jamie and Jessie."

"Whoa. What-wait" Jack put his hands out in front of him, "brain damage, since when do I have brain damage?"

All of the guardians glared at Tooth, "since you got your memories back" Tooth admitted, guiltily. Landing on the ground and folding her wings behind her.

"Why didn't any of you tell me this?!" Jack said incredulously, running his hands though his hair.

"We did," North said, "and you didn't believe us."

Jack frozen and looked at North for a second, "I don't-" suddenly his head snapped to between North and Bunny, he took a step back covering his mouth, eyes wide, "I-I no."

"Listen mate" Bunny said, nervously, "you had a bad case of denial, so we kinda-"

"YOU! Jack yelled angrily, face twisting into hate, pointing at Bunny, "and you!" he turned on North, "I trusted- you two- you _attacked_ me!"

"Only because you wouldn't accept the truth mate!" Bunnymund defended angrily standing up, "you were throwing storms around because you were mad at yourself; we didn't have any other option but to do this by force. Because you couldn't accept the truth"

"Can we please not do this now?" Tooth said, rubbing her temples, but the two ignored her.

"Maybe I would have accepted it if you told me so here, not just making some asinine excuse about clothes," Jack said hotly.

"Hey, you came up with the clothes thing on your own," Bunnymund said hotly, "I had nothing to d-"

Sandy flew up between the two, holding his arms out between them, indicating for them to stop. He glared at the both of them equally. he conjured the image of a rabbit and a snowflake, with comic text bubbles appearing over their heads, then a big X over the scene "Sandy's right," Tooth said, "you two arguing is getting us nowhere"

Both Jack and Bunny looked like they were about to say something, when Tooth yelled, scarring the both of them "IT DOESN'T MATTER WHO STARTED IT, WE ARE ENDING IT NOW!" she yelled angrily, almost as if she were addressing two unruly children, she turned to Jack, and spoke with a voice that indicated she was way past the last straw "Jack, you do have brain damage, and yes I'm sorry we kind of had to force you into therapy, but we are doing this whether you think you have to or not. Because you do need this, and you do- DON'T EVEN TRY TO ARGUE THAT YOU DON'T" Jack, who had looked like he was about to say something swallowed his words, and looked away from the Fairy hovering in front of his face. She glared at him for a second, letting the message get through, then rounded on Bunnymund, "and YOU, you have hardly done anything useful since this whole session began. You've done nothing but snide remarks and insults. I know that's the kind of friendship you have with Jack, where you two annoy the HELL out of each other, and have fun doing it, but I don't want any more of that happening until Jack is back to normal. Sit down and don't say anything unless it exudes rainbows and good feelings, UNDERSTAND?!" Bunnymund also wilted under Toothina's angry gaze, he sat down without any protest, looking guilty. Sandy floated up behind Tooth, clapping silently to show his approval. North sat awkwardly himself, clearly relieved that Tooth hadn't blown up at him, and obviously wanting to avoid her wrath as well.

"Now," Tooth clasped her hands together and took a calming breath, then turned to Jack, "as you can see from the memory that just played, your brain is confusing memories of your sister with Jamie. In order to fix this we'll have to make a connection with the full memory. Just, try. Remember what really happened. What happened after Jessie said the Easter Bunny was real?"

"It- do I really have to do this" Jack asked waving his hand, Tooth merely glared at him, and he nodded "gonna take that as a yes. Okay, let's see… there was…" Jack's brown scrunched up and slowly the memory from the 1700 Easter faded back into view.

_"The Easter Bunny is real!_" Jessie said angrily. Mike froze and turned around slowly, "_a bit of a mouth your sister has, doesn't she Jack? Figures a poor Shepard like your dad doesn't have any manors to teach his kids. No wonder you two cling so hopelessly to fantasy's such as the Easter Bunny; must make your lives a whole lot less dull._" Younger Jack's face went dark, "_they aren't hopeless, and they're true. I feel sorry for you, Mike that you don't have a good enough heart to believe. Come on Jessie_" he said taking his sister's hand, "_let's go see if we can find more eggs. Don't listen to this brute. He isn't worth our time." "That's right you shoeless fairy_!" Mike said snidely as Jack and his sister walked away, "_go on, keep believing in your fantasies. But we'll see how many winter's you last on them!" "Jack, is a fairy_?" Jessie said eyes wide and Mike started cackling. Jack nearly dropped the egg he was holding and looked over at his sister, "_what? No of course not!"_ he said indignantly. Jessie frowned, "_is Jack be fairy a bad thing?_" she asked looking between mike and Jack. The guardians could see the realization click in Jack's head when he realized that his sister didn't know Mike was insulting her brother "_uh, no it's just that I'm not_" Jack said recovering, ignoring Mike's laughter, "I mean do I look like one?" he said trying to make a joke, turning his back to her, "see no, wings. So I'm not." "But Mike says Jack is fairy" Jessie said, her young mind obviously not able to wrap her head around the situation. "That's because Mike is a liar," Jack said then changed the subject "here, go show this egg to mom." As soon as his sister was out of ear shot, he rounded to the older boy behind him, "have you no shame!" he hissed at the boy, "she's two! You're the one with no manners, teaching insults to a toddler" "am not," Mike said hotly, "and you're the one who's lying, everyone knows exactly what you are, I mean look at you. Might as well be a girl what with all the knitting and sowing you do; is that what you are, a girl in boy's clothing" "Mike, if you don't walk away right now, I am going to beat you down into the dirt." Younger Jack warned, face going dark, "and it will not be pretty" "bring it on, tramp" Mike sneered. Jack's fist connected harshly with Mike's face, knocking him back. Jack didn't wait for Mike to recover, jumping on top of him and punching him repeatedly in the face. Several villagers crowded around to watch the scene, but only one man had the nerve to step in and stop the two. The reverend from the church walked calmly up to the fight, and pulled Jack up by the scruff of the neck "ENOUGH" he said sternly, as he set Jack down. "Sir, he just attacked me, I don't know what happened. He must have some kind of demon inside him or something" Mike cried, nose bloody as he picked himself off the ground. "He's lying" Young Jack nearly snarled, "pastor; he was saying that I was a fairy, and several other improper words that insinuated very wrong things. In front of my sister as well! I told him that if he didn't stop I would beat him, and he didn't so I punched him." all of the villagers grew quiet, as the pastor took a deep breath. "I see" the man said calmly, "Mike is this true, did you provoke an attack from Jackson?" "n-no!" Mike said, holding his bloody nose, but he was obviously lying. "Mike you are lying," The pastor said harshly, "telling untruths corrupts the soul and makes one evil. As does rising to the bait of violence" the pastor said, turning to Jack, who shuffled his feet, "and I will not let such behavior continue. The two of you will apologize to each other right now, and I will talk to both of your parents about a fit punishment." The two boys glared at each other, "I'm sorry" Jack said grudgingly, after a few seconds, "I shouldn't have punched you" Mike glared at Jack for a full minute, then crossed his arms, "I'm sorry" the boy grumbled, then marched off as the memory faded out.

"I had to scrub the church floor for a week because of that boy" Jack said angrily, "all because of him as well, filthy pig." He crossed his arms, and turned to Tooth, "there I remembered the rest. Are we done now?"

"No, there are still more memories we have to go through," Tooth said, "let's just hope the others are as easy to fix"

The next memory faded in, and the guardians found themselves at a pond much smaller than Jack's lake, fed by a tiny trail of water. Jack, maybe two years older, had grown almost a foot taller. He held his sister's hand as she and him walked quietly into the clearing, _"and this here is the lake_," Jack said to his sister, "_We'll let the sheep drink and graze some, then bring them back home."_ As Jack said this, several sheep filtered out from the woods, approaching the lake. Jack kneeled next to his sister, crooked staff in hand "_alright Jessie, can you count the sheep for me?" "Yes_!" the little girl said happily, "_one, two, thwee_" she counted slowly as the sheep began to filter in through the trees, "_four five, six…_" she paused, frowning, "_ninty, tenty_!" she said happily, as more sheep filtered into the view. "_Very good_" Jack chuckled, then stood up, counted the sheep himself in his head, then led his sister toward the flock now gathered at the water's edge. "_Rammy_" Jessie said fondly, hugging a huge ram, who looked over blankly at her for a second, then returned to his grazing. Jack stood up over the sheep, and kept an eye over the flock as they began to graze around the clearing, keeping a firm grip on his sister's hand, but letting her lead him around the clearing to look at flowers. Younger Jack's brow furrowed when several sheep approached the far side of the clearing, and then immediately doubled back to the side Jack was on. "_Jessie, want to do something fun_?" Jack said, taking her over to the sheep, he lifted her up and placed her on top of Rammy "_hold on to his wool like this_," Jack said keeping an eye on the far side of the clearing, showing her how to clutch onto the white fluff without hurting the sheep, _"and don't let go until I say so, understand?" _Jessie nodded, smiling at the game as her older brother walked to the other side of the clearing. "_Jack_?" she said, blinking at her older brother. Jack put a finger over his mouth to tell her to be silent, "_shh, I think I saw a rabbit. Stay with Rammy_" he then drew his bow from his quiver, and notched an arrow, but didn't draw it back. As soon as he was behind the first tree, his expression changed from one of innocence to threateningly serious face. He examined around the woods in front of him, walking forward at a slow pace, keeping to the shadows of the trees, and not making any sound. There was the sound of rustling behind a tree surrounded by bushes ahead, and Jack drew the arrow back to his cheek, approaching where the sound had come from. Jack rounded the trunk of the tree, aiming at the source of the sound, and found his arrow aimed directly a comatose Pitch Black.

All of the guardians either flinched or took a step back "Holly Manny cheese on a cracker," Jack said standing up in a panic, "that's Pitch!"

"You knew Pitch before you became a guardian?" North questioned.

"What's more than that, he believed in him?!" Bunny said, throwing his hands out in question. But fell silent again with a look from Sandy

"I don't-" Jack said, gesticulating wildly, "I don't remember him at all!" he turned to the Pitch in his memories, "what the hell is he doing here!?"

"Well maybe if you guys shut up and listen, we'll find out" Tooth shushed them, as if they were arguing while she was watching a show on television. Sandy made some images to show his agreement, and they all turned back to the memory.

Young Jack froze, arrow trained at Pitch threateningly, and All the guardians blinked at the sight of their enemy. He didn't look as intimidating as he usually did. He looked much thinner, much too thin to be healthy. He also had what looked like several cuts and burns, and his clothes, usually immaculate, were worn out and thin. All this coupled with the fact that he was curled up in a fetal position, on the forest floor, made some of them frown.

"He looks like he got drug through hell and back" Bunnymund commented, being immediately shushed by everyone.

Young Jack examined the surrounding around them quickly, before looking back down at the spirit in front of him. "_Hey_" young Jack said, tapping Pitch's leg with his foot, when Pitch didn't respond, Jack kicked him a little harder "_hey!_" When Pitch didn't respond again, Jack tsked and crouched over the man in front of him. Still keeping his hands on the bow and arrow, Jack awkwardly reached out and put two fingers to Pitch's neck to check for a pulse. The evil spirit reacted as if he had been touched with a hot blade. Immediately jumping up, and scrambling away from the boy in front of him, clutching his neck. Jack, in reaction to Pitch's sudden movement, had redrawn his bow, and had it aimed at the spirit in front of him. Pitch stared, wide eyed at the boy in front of him, young Jack returned with a glare. After a few seconds, Jack spoke "_Do you speak English_?" he asked, keeping the bow trained on the man. "_speak-yes-yes, I do_" Pitch replied, his voice sounding hoarse and torn, made as if to stand up, but couldn't seem to muster the strength to do so, "_y-you can see me_?" Pitch asked, then swallowed and tried to clear his voice. Jack looked like he was about to say something, when his little sister rounded the trunk of the tree, "J_ack_?" she asked walking up to her brother, "_did you call for me? I head you talking_" Her path carried her strait through Pitch, who grabbed his stomach and grimaced at the feeling of being walked through. The memory cracked; summer time turned into winter, and Jamie was running away from Pitch, who was clutching his stomach in pain, "_noo! Ah_" he stood up and patted his chest, in disbelief "_noo…_" he turned, and stared at the guardians in fear, before fading out.

"What- no" Jack said standing up, "what happened?" he turned to the guardians, as if for an answer.

"This memory must be damaged as well," Tooth said, "Jack, you have to remember what really happened that first time you met… Pitch"

"I wonder what happened, to make him like that" North said, eyes knit, "we didn't see Pitch until recently, after the dark ages"

Sandy jumped up, raising his finger as if he had an idea. He conjured a globe, with dots on it, which diminished in number rapidly, "you think he didn't have enough believers?" North asked, and Sandy nodded, he also conjured a picture of Pitch, flinching away from the sun, then the image of a flame, "and the sun was what hurt him, that makes lots of sense"

"So this is what Pitch meant," Jack said slowly, looking off into the distance, a thought full look on his face.

"What did he mean?" Bunny asked, frowning.

"Nothing, just… nothing" Jack shook his head, and then turned to Tooth, "so what happens next?"

"That is for you to show us," North said, raising his hand to Jack, "you have to remember"

Jack frowned as if concentrating hard, the memory sprung up again, and the guardians watched again as Jack's sister ran through Pitch, only for the scene to crackle and change "I- I can't remember" Jack said, "I don't even really remember the first half of the memory, I mean it obviously has to be one, but I don't… remember meeting Pitch until like- years into being a spirit"

"Well," Tooth hovered up to him, "try remembering what you fell at that exact moment, what did you think when your sister walked though him?"

"I thought-" The memory came up again, however paused, his sister halfway through Pitch, "that he must not be-. But I-" the imaged crackled, and now Jamie was walking through Pitch, "it hurts so much," Jack said painfully, "a-and I did that to him, I made become him invisible"

"Jack," Bunnymund said speaking up, "try and focus on the memory with your sister, not the one with Jamie."

"but-" Jack shook his head, "its- I did that to him. I made him, just like I was…"

"What we did to Pitch had to be done," North said, placing a hand on Jack's shoulder, "I know it is painful, what we did to him. But if we had not, he would have turned all of the children into fearlings, and would have shrouded the world in shadows"

"but, it's wrong" Jack said, eyes "all he wanted was to be seen, and sure he went about it in the worst way possible, but we can't just- he deserves to be seen, everyone does. It's just so…" Jack looked out into the darkness "wrong to do something like that. And we did that to him, but we are the good guys" all of the guardians paused to consider what Jack was saying.

"Jack," Tooth said gently, "tell you what, after we fix you up, we'll go talk to Pitch. We'll see… if we can do something for him. I don't know what, but we'll figure something out… but in order to do that, you need to remember what happened when you first met him. What did you think, when Jessie walked through him?"

"That… he wasn't human" Jack said slowly, as the memory faded back into view, "that he must have been some sort of fay."

Pitch grabbed his stomach as Jessie unknowingly walked through the boogie man. Young Jack looked between his sister and Pitch, with Pitch looking between Jack's sister and him, "_no, I didn't_" Jack said smiling at his sister, "_I was just asking the rabbit to come out of hiding. Go back to Rammy, and keep your hand on his side, until I come back and I'll sing you your favorite song, okay?_" The little girl seemed to brighten up at the promise of being sung to "_okay!_" she said, then trotted back to the lake, this time Pitch managed to dodge the child as she went by, leaning hard against the tree trunk to do so. As soon as his sister was gone, he rounded back to Pitch, bow drawn "_You will not hurt me or my sister, do you swear on this_?" he said, menacingly. Pitch blinked at the boy's sudden mood change, "_uh- yes_?" he said. "_You swear_?" Jack asked again, Pitch frowned in confusion "_yes, do you have a hearing problem or something?" "You swear?" "Why do I-"_ Pitch paused when Jack drew the bow back a little, "_yes I swear_." He said quickly, and then cleared his throat again because it was still soar. Jack lowered his bow, "_just had to make sure*"_ he sheathed his arrow in their quiver, but kept the bow in his hand. Jack then pulled a small water sack off of his shoulder, and handed it to Pitch. Pitch took the water, and drank from it deeply, before putting the cap back on, "_thank you_" he said, voice sounding much better the dark spirit eyed the boy for a second, then posed a question "_why can you see me?"_ He asked, examining Jack from his brown hair to his muddy bare feet "_you don't… believe in me…" "I believed something was scarring the sheep"_ Young Jack shrugged, "_are you lost?_" Pitch scowled, crossing his arms and not meeting his eyes _"no, not at all, why would you ask that?"_ Jack merely shrugged again, "_you look like you are. That or something attacked you, are those burns?_" Jack frowned, reaching forward and pulling his collar away, revealing a nasty burn down the side of Pitch's neck. Pitch slapped his hand away, "_don't- yes it is, what is your deal, go away so I can get back to sleep" "you weren't asleep, you were passed out_" Young Jack said seriously , he looked around then stood up, "_come on, you're coming with me_" Pitch did a double take, "_why- no! Why would I want to go following some random, inane boy home?" "Because that random, inane boy has burn cream, and is willing to help you_" Jack said, "_now do you want help or not?"_ Jack offered his hand, to help Pitch stand up from the ground. Pitch looked at Jack's earnest face, then the hand that was being offered to him. Slowly his gaze drifted to the forest beyond them, more specifically to the sunlight filtering in through the canopy above them, "_go home boy_," Pitch said softly looking down at his lap, "_just go_," Jack stood there, hand outstretched for a few seconds longer, then dropped his hand, "_okay_," he said, "_but if you change your mind, there's a pond that's safe to drink from, just a behind the trees there, and if you take the trail from the pond, there's a road, take a left and you will get to a small village. it's a well beaten path_" Jack said all this as he hung the water sack on a thick branch of the bush, and put another small bag, containing bread and nuts beside it. Jack paused, looking over at the spirit leaning against the tree, "_you sure?"_ Pitch didn't say anything to the boy, just leaned back against the tree, and looked away. Jack hesitated once more, before walking back to his sister, the memory fading away.

* * *

AN: sorry it took me so long to update, I was a little stuck as far as progress went, and the scenes just didn't feel right, so I had to start from scratch. School also started, so that is eating up my time. However I will continue to struggle on in my spare time!

Sandy and North don't do a lot in this chapter… it's so hard to fit all of them in. Tooth is a little out of character as well….

I decided to do the memory with Pitch because he hasn't gotten a chance to be in the story yet, and I absolutely love the idea that him and Jack met before Jack became a guardian. It's a head cannon of mine.

*I've heard in the Dresden files that a fairy, or fay, cannot tell a lie three times in a row, and when they are sworn to do something they must repeat it three times, or else the Fairy can go back on their deal. This is why Jack asks him to swear three times, so that he knows Pitch won't hurt him or his sister. (Basically young Jack assumes Pitch is some sort of fairy)

*shadows are chased away by light, so it would make sense that the sun hurts shadow beings like Pitch. (in my opinion)


End file.
